Feb 10 2017 Will Be Race for Buyers with U.S. Dollars

If there’s one overarching trend, it’s that 2017 will be a race for buyers with U.S. dollars to spend, said Thomas Veraguth, real estate strategist at UBS Wealth Management according to Mansion Global.

"Anyone who has a dollar income is able to buy everywhere in the world today and certainly [in 2017] due to the strength of the dollar and the weakness of all other currencies," Mr. Veraguth said.

Ultimately, that means that the U.S. real estate market is primed to do well, especially in the high-end segment of the market, with luxury home sales increasing in 37 out of 43 counties analyzed, contrary to the opinions of most Wall Street analysts and press reports.

Here are some facts about the luxury market in the United States:

Sales of homes priced above $600,000 have risen in 37 of the 43 counties* where data was analyzed.

Home sales above $600,000 in the last 12 months exceed sales in the prior 12 months by 10%.

Home sales in Q3 2016 exceeded sales in Q3 2015 by 5%.

Sales have increased in every price increment from $600,000 to $1.5 million+.

And after five straight years of a seller's market, with progressive reflation in Manhattan residential real estate (2010-2015), we are finally seeing the NYC real estate market swing back toward a buyer's market. Of course, just how much leverage a buyer gained still heavily depends on the price point, because what’s happening at the high end is drastically different than what’s happening at the lower end. As Urban Digs reported, the market hit its peak performance sometime in summer almost two years ago, around June/July of 2015, with real-time metrics (Supply, Pending Sales, Deal Volume, Days on Market, etc) all confirming that sellers enjoyed the highest deal volume activity and leverage from late 2014 into mid-2015.

In our view, the fall from peak prices troughed in early 2016. That was the gloomiest part of this latest down cycle, but since then the market has normalized and ‘weakly rebounded’ to where we are today.

Weakness hit the sector in Fall of 2015 which lasted until March or so when we began to recover. It seems sales stats are only now starting to reflect that recovery.

"Soft" and "cool" are the most commonly used words to describe luxury markets from San Francisco to Miami, which are experiencing overdevelopment in the highest tiers and price concessions as a result. Analysts are using stronger language to describe London, which is feeling the pains of a heightened stamp duty and currency turmoil.

in a report aired by Maria Bartiromo on FOX Business, the high-end market in the U.S. is actually heating up, with luxury home sales increasing in 37 out of 43 counties analyzed.

Perhaps this means some dramatic changes for the US housing industry, which saw healthy increases in values this year thanks to factors including low interest rates, lower gas prices, stronger wage growth and millennials getting off the fence and entering the market.

The Big Apple’s luxury property market has been letting out a collective sigh of relief since the presidential election.

Contracts for properties over $4 million saw a spike at the end of the year, as the final vote restored a modicum of certainty for the industry.

Even Mr. Trump’s chaotic, drama-filled transition hasn’t slowed the deluge of post-election activity. At $371.6 million, the last week of November notched a year-high for recorded dollar contracts, according to the weekly Olshan report. Many of the properties entered into contract that week were at the new 30 Park Place condominium in Tribeca.

With a sense of political uncertainty assuaged, activity will remain slightly heightened at the start of 2017, as developers are proactive in negotiating deals (even if that means discounting units), said Jonathan Miller, the chief executive of appraisal firm Miller Samuel and author of Douglas Elliman’s market reports.

"It’s going to come down to getting it over with," Mr. Miller said. "Now that the uncertainty is gone, that’s going to help new development to a certain degree."

The post-election exhale will eventually pass and for most of 2017, New York’s most expensive properties will continue to suffer from a glut of available units, which led in 2016 to a rash of staggering price reductions.

"When we’re talking about multi-family housing, like condos, there’s still a lot of product streaming into the market, and that’s not going away," Mr. Miller said.

Oversupply at the tippy top will likely spur more development at the lower end of the luxury spectrum, a segment of the market that is still selling well, Mr. Miller said. "We’ll see more product coming on, skewed lower than it has been in years past," he said.